One of the first things I referenced when I started this project was the ‘Maker’s Bill of Rights’ document that Make Magazine published some time ago – a kind of set of standards for makers of open objects such that said objects can be sure to be repairable and hackable. As with most things to [...]

As you may have noticed, I’ve been spending some time here. The main reason, I won’t lie, is because I’ve been ill at home and its about the only project of my many that I can really do whilst sitting around in my dressing gown feeling slightly queasy. So that’s why.
Why 3D now?
In other news, [...]

My favourite thing about the recent religious festival that is the first distribution of iPads has definitely been iFixit’s teardown which has been recorded meticulously and with amazing speed on their blog. If you don’t know, a teardown is basically a documentation of someone taking apart an object, normally for the purposes of hacking or [...]

Have been updating the parts list for v0.25, including trying to find a better trimcap that can actually be adjusted by hand, or hacked in such a way as to make that possible. Found this one on rapid that might be more suitable.
Have also ordered in some hand adjustable 50k resistors to implement Andrew’s attenuator [...]

Have updated the niftymitter 0.24 parts list to 0.24.1 to accommodate a more detailed description of the trimcap (4 – 20 pf or sim.)

I am now past the end of my stint in Dundee. I had a great time, and have made some good friends amongst some very fine people and designers (the two are not mutually exclusive, except in this case). In no particular order a big thanks to everyone who has helped me with this project [...]

Sparkfun, a hacker-aimed US electronics supplier are giving away stuff for free tomorrow – up to $100 worth of stuff provided you don’t mind paying shipping and can face a potentially bottlenecked site as thousands of people try and do the same!
Anyway, in checking that out, I clicked through to BatchPCB , where one can [...]

One of the great things about Google Code is that it enforces developers to stick to a strict policy regarding version updates: it actively discourages deleting files once they are uploaded and makes version tracking pretty darn simple. It’s not something I probably would have down well otherwise, but because of it, have downloaded pdfs [...]

An instructables member named agis68 commented over on the coil making instructable about a DIY inductance meter from Electronics-DIY.com . While there however, I found that the same website has a variety of well documented FM transmitter designs. This one in particular looks quite promising – could make a good Niftymitter upgrade for the future?

Another thing that came up in my discussion with Shaleph recently was the age old quandry of the maker: being bound to making kits. This being the first open source project proper that I’ve initiated, it’s not something that I’ve had to wrestle with before but I know it is something that many others don’t enjoy: sourcing [...]